Module POL3262 for 2021/2
- Overview
- Aims and Learning Outcomes
- Module Content
- Indicative Reading List
- Assessment
Undergraduate Module Descriptor
POL3262: The Idea of Human Rights
This module descriptor refers to the 2021/2 academic year.
Module Content
Syllabus Plan
Whilst the precise content may vary from year to year, it is envisaged that the syllabus will cover all or some of the following topics:
- The history of the idea of human rights
- Arendt’s critique of human rights
- Rorty’s anti-foundational defence of human rights
- Normative theories of human rights
- John Rawls’ ‘law of peoples’
- Human rights and contemporary politics
- Critics of human rights
Learning and Teaching
This table provides an overview of how your hours of study for this module are allocated:
| Scheduled Learning and Teaching Activities | Guided independent study | Placement / study abroad |
|---|---|---|
| 22 | 128 |
...and this table provides a more detailed breakdown of the hours allocated to various study activities:
| Category | Hours of study time | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Scheduled Learning and Teaching Activities | 22 | 11 x 2 hour seminars |
| Guided independent study | 44 | Preparing for seminars: Reading and research |
| Guided independent study | 84 | Completing assessment tasks: Reading, research and writing |
Online Resources
This module has online resources available via ELE (the Exeter Learning Environment).
Indicative Reading List
This reading list is indicative - i.e. it provides an idea of texts that may be useful to you on this module, but it is not considered to be a confirmed or compulsory reading list for this module.
The reading will vary from year to year, but will usually include a number of classic historical and contemporary texts that concern human rights, including the following:
- Thomas Paine, Rights of Man (1791 [1995]), ed. Mark Philp, Oxford: Oxford University Press
- Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (1958) London: George Allen & Unwin
- John Rawls, The Law of Peoples (1999) Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press
- James Griffin, On Human Rights (2008) Oxford: Oxford University Press
- Charles Beitz, The Idea of Human Rights (2009) Oxford: Oxford University Press
